Blogs

‘When you start your own enterprise, you need to be hands-on over everything’ is a lesson you learn each day. Although I thought I was prepared, there were always newer revelations.

We had been getting feedback since the winter holidays in Dec ’09 that NaVaRaSa needs to have camps for various activities like a summer/winter camp. We missed the winter bus and started planning the ‘summer camp’ for April & May 2010 with gusto. We tried to understand what really happens in the camps, explored various options, came out with more of our own.

I had major plans of kick-starting NaVaRaSa’s activities during Navaratri with a demo and interactive session on each of the nine days. It seemed like a miraculous coincidence that all 9s were falling together – ‘NaVa’RaSa, ‘Nava’ratri, September the 9th month of 2009 and quitting my job after exactly 9 years!! Although I was never into numerology or astrology, it just felt surreal, like nothing but great things can come off it.

Will prenuptials prove to be the safety net that Indian women lack in the current system? Smitha Rao looks at this possibility in view of Sania Mirza receiving a Mehr of 61 lakhs from her groom. 

Maybe we should have a law on this.

Being an entrepreneur does not just mean having an idea and making it work. It takes more than that. It is a life choice one makes. One chooses a 24 hour enterprise over a 9 to 5 job. One chooses to forgo salaries for erratic (at least in the initial phase) profits. One chooses to run the show instead of being just a cog in the large corporate wheel. Shridevi B M chose such life with NaVaRaSa. She shares her journey with the readers of JF through her blog Living The Change.

There is true a story of an upright but brusque man who lived in a village sometime in the 1950s and made as many enemies as friends. One day his enemies ganged up, and turned up at his home to finish him off. His wife opened the door, beamed at them, ushered them in, sat them down in the way only elderly south Indian women can and served them an excellent lunch. They ate and left, never to return. I take a page from the books of both the lady and the gang of men: 1. Feed people: it helps. 2. Eat: it helps. 

M F Hussain’s acceptance of Qatar nationality has kicked up the debate on freedom of expression and the  secular status of this country, yet again. But Smitha Rao questions if it is alright to ‘parade women’s anatomy’ in the name of art.

What is it about “legendary” painter M F Hussain vis-à-vis his work, women, life and letters? And why hasn’t he learnt to perpetrate one Truth / falsehood, like, for instance is he fundamentally secular, and he is an Indian or a Qatar national finally?